Windows 7: Hibernate or Hybrid Sleep?

The question now I've worked out that I have Hibernate & Hybrid Sleep enabled (which I think may have been the default) is, should I change it so I can hibernate from the start menu, or should I just put it in sleep mode and let that replace hibernation safe in the knowledge that during a power cut the session from the RAM will in fact be restored?



Hybrid sleep sounds like a good idea, but hibernate did always feel a little safer....

On another note sleep does take longer to kick in, and also for me (annoyingly) after I press 'sleep' on the start menu, it does eventually wind down (no more fan noise, monitor goes to standby) but only for a split second before 'waking up' immediately.

I use Hybrid sleep and I like it.
It saves the Windows session to both RAM and FILE (hiberfil.sys) when going to Sleep.

For me, on wake up:
If the power did not go out during sleep, the PC Wakes from Sleep in < 5 seconds.
If the power did go out during sleep, the PC Resumes from Hibernate in apx 20-30 seconds.

I'm sure it takes longer to go to sleep because it does have to save the Session to RAM(Sleep) AND FILE(Hibernate), but that's ok for me.
I like the faster Wake Up rather than the slower Resume from Hibernate.
For me 99.99% of the time, my PC(s) Wake from sleep and hiberfil.sys is not used.

I think of Hybrid Sleep as an insurance policy...If Wake Up fails, Hibernate kicks in.
Either way, the session is restored.

The cons to using Hybrid:
- Takes longer to go to sleep
- Requires more disk space for the hiberfil.sys file (assuming you don't use hibernate)

Pros using Hybrid:
- faster wake up normally, AND slower hibernate resume as a "back up" if needed
- uses both sleep and hibernate

RE:

Does that mean your PC sleeps for "long" periods of time with the fans running, or does it mean your PC immediately wakes up after going to sleep, or something else...?

I certainly agree with you there, it gives you the best of both worlds and would be my chosen method of minimising risk of data loss whilst conserving energy in a speedy and efficient way... but only if it worked!

My PC doesn't sleep at all. To describe what happens as accurately as possible:

**update** whilst I was attempting to sleep, I unplugged the cradle for my phone, as I noticed that after immediately waking after a half second of sleeping there as a bubble notification about a device not being recognised. After unplugging this, it's sleeping as usual. I can go back into device manager now and allow my ethernet adaptor to wake the computer (but only with a 'magic packet') so that's back to normal.

I'm not sure of a way to prevent USB peripherals from waking the computer (although I have prevented my mouse from waking the computer now in case of accidental waking) so I will simply unplug my phone cradle/battery when putting the computer to sleep. I little inconvenient (especially as I believe it carries on charging my phone battery [note: phone is not plugged in, it has a battery charging feature for loose batteries] even when sleeping.

So that will be the next thing for me to figure out, along with figuring out how to gain access remotely to my computer when it is sleeping. I don't believe Teamviewer (my preferred remote access software) has the ability to send magic packets, nor do I know much about magic packets at all (nothing a bit of Googling won't resolve

Thanks David


p.s. I'm very pleased with the time it takes to sleep considering I've got 8GB of RAM. I'm also not concerned in the slightest with the hiberfil.sys file taking up space... as it gives a nice little buffer should I ever run out of space and need something I can simply get rid of in a hurry.

DavidW7ncus,

I use Hibernate myself. Do you know if it's possible for either Hybrid Sleep or Hibernate to drain Keyboard and Mouse batteries? I'm pretty sure that since I switched from Hybrid to Hibernate my batteries are lasting much longer.

It could be just a coincidence though.

There is no power except to RAM during sleep, so that it can store the data. Data is simultaneously written to HD during Hybrid Sleep so that in case of Power loss it isn't lost. It's like David said, an insurance policy. I see no downside.

Any device which has the ability to wake up the PC should have a Power option in it's driver file in Device Manager to disable Wake. If not I would not use it. I do not want anything interfering with my PC's sleeping in 30 and Hibernating in 45-90 so that I can walk away leaving work open and have it waiting on my desktop whether I come back in an hour or a week. One less thing to think about.

Strangely, the computer will now sleep with the phone cradle USB device plugged in and now that the mouse has been prevented from waking the computer. Maybe it was the mouse after all, but that still leaves a mystery... so I did a test.

I discovered that unplugging the USB phone cradle (with battery in - but no phone connected) allows the computer to sleep (whilst mouse is allowed to wake the computer) and I woke up the computer using the mouse. I then plugged in the USB device and changed the mouse properties in device manager which no longer allowed the mouse to wake the computer and in this case it also went to sleep no problem. I had to use the power button to wake it. Then just for good measure I tried with both the mouse set to allow the computer to wake, and the USB cradle plugged in, and it simply wouldn't stay sleeping for more than 1 second, even though the Microsoft Intellimouse optical beam would shut off (I've been using the click buttons on the mouse to wake previously as moving the mouse doesn't wake it)

Well anyway I've found my ideal settings and it's not an issue any more. I've notice the keyboard also doesn't wake the computer despite the settings in 'power management' in 'device manager' being set to allow the keyboard to wake the PC (I tried several keys and combinations). I've actually read that a PC's Bios can be altered to allow Wake On Lan to occur to turn the computer on (as well as simple wake from sleep) from being powered down (shut down). It's not really necessary for me (or most people I'd assume) as it's not difficult simply pressing the button. In fact it's probably better that way.

What I would still like to do is WOL (wake on lan) remotely so that I can then use Teamviewer to remotely access my PC. It seems that this is going to be quite a feat from an external network (ie. the internet) so I was wondering if anyone here has successfully done this before? It would be a shame to have the hybrid sleep feature, and then not to be able to use it when I leave the house so I can make sure I can access my PC when I'm out. With WOL working from another network (or my phone) I could use hybrid sleep most of the time when not using my computer safe in the knowledge I'm not cutting out the option to access it later whilst out.

Another question is how often (assuming you sleep rather than shut down) is a good time to restart a computer? I used hybrid sleep on my netbook and often got a warning about 'quick start' after 7 days of not restarting. On my Quadcore PC though it doesn't seem to lag too much even if it hasn't been restarted in some time.

From the TeamViewer forum:

http://teamviewerforums.com/index.php?topic=1226.0

I try to restart every few days.

It looks like Greg answered all the questions already.
Thanks Greg, and nice info on WOL!

I believe MS recommends re-booting at least weekly.
With my HTPC I go well beyond that and may not re-boot for weeks without any warnings or problems.
My Test box gets re-booted much more often as that is where i try new programs, configuration changes, etc.

@andreasandrews
Glad you found a solution with settings - nice work.
If you haven't done this already when the PC does not sleep, from an Elevated Command Prompt enter these commands:

powercfg -devicequery wake_armed
powercfg -requests

If either command returns something, that could be why the PC won't sleep.

@Burdus77
I don't think Hybrid or Hibernate would affect battery life.
I think battery Brand, Type, and Age could make a difference.

I've purchased some better rechargeables. Some Sanyo Eneloops. These should perform better.

One thing I have noticed is if I put my pc into hybrid sleep and the power gets cut from the mains while sleeping, after rebooting my pc becomes very slow and laggy for the first 5 minutes.

Is this something to do with having to restore the state from the hibernation file?

Interestingly I just put a rechargeable in a mouse to see how it works...
I've always used regular batteries, so I'll see how it goes...
If you do find a better rechargeable, let me know ! Thanks.

I see the same thing as you do, and I don't understand why this would happen.
If my PC resumes from Hibernate it is slow/laggey for several minutes...compared to a Sleep/wake up.

i.e. I have a scheduled task set to run on Wake up.
If the PC Wakes up from Sleep, the task runs immediately.
If the PC resumes from Hibernate, the task does not run for a minute or more...

MY GUESS is windows is slower reading the data from the HD, processing an instruction, and reading more "Restore Session" instructions and processing them...
Seems Windows is MUCH faster processing the "Restore Session" from RAM.

It's really no big deal to me as most of the time my PC wakes from sleep, but it is weird...